From New America Media: There were a lot of words used to describe Al Davis, the 82-year-old owner of the Oakland Raiders National Football franchise, when it was announced he passed away at his Oakland residence last [month]. Davis was called a legend, tough, demanding, ruthless, sneaky, renegade, pioneer, hall of famer and Oakland Raider. Davis was all of these, as well as a stand-up man for diversity in sports and in particular his team. 

From New America Media -- China Daily USA (posted October 28, 2011): The world's population [was] expected to reach 7 billion on Monday [October 31, 2011], four years later than once predicted largely thanks to China's family planning policy, according to the country's top population experts. Population growth has rocketed. It took just 13 years for 1 billion more people to live on the planet, yet only at the dawn of the 19th century did a billion people first inhabit the Earth, according to a report by the United Nations Population Fund.

AOL has been treading on shaky ground for a while. Layoffs have taken place in 2007, 2009, 2010, as well as this year. As the company fights to carve out a niche for itself in the ever-expanding, busy world of the Internet, the value of AOL’s stock continues to dwindle as rumors swirl that AOL will be put up for sale. 

The positions of Ron Paul and other Republicans on the issue of healthcare—whether it be through the advocacy of unrealizable autonomy or the use of various red herrings—serve only as an impediment to access, degree of coverage and improvement in quality of care. The reality of attaining health insurance is not just about choice; for many, it’s about luck. Expanding healthcare coverage diminishes the unjust force luck has in each person’s life.

There is perhaps no name more widely renowned in modern American literature than Hemingway. The Hemingways after Ernest continue to intrigue both those well-acquainted and those less familiar with his work. The continued fascination with the Hemingway name  poses a question: What  do we expect from the children of fame? Though we prize family traditions (Francis Ford and daughter Sofia Coppola), we are equally compelled by differences (Gloria Vanderbilt and son Anderson Cooper). Do genetics predetermine greatness or is upbringing to blame?

Grand Cayman Island, famously described as a sunny place for shady people, owes its extraordinary rise and equally spectacular fall to three people: expat lawyer Bill Walker, best-selling novelist John Grisham and President Barack Obama. This tiny coral-encrusted British territory has long claimed to be the world’s fifth-largest financial center, routinely ranked with Hong Kong, Zurich and London. More than a trillion US dollars are said to be parked in Cayman, most of it in 8,000 trust funds (75 percent of the world’s registered trust funds).

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Once upon a time, the San Francisco Bay Area was a haven for liberals, who found a welcoming home in the city and environs that gave rise to the Free Speech Movement; became a sanctuary for war objectors; and whose politics proved a thorn in the backside of the right-wing then-governor, Ronald Reagan. But the live-and-let-live attitude that marked the ‘60s and ‘70s has given rise to a more intolerant brand of liberalism, which is considered (by more moderate Democrats) as a dangerous crack in San Francisco’s formerly reputable veneer. 

The words global warming used to mean something. When the term became popular in the early 1990s, it sounded like something out of a science-fiction movie. Today, however, it is thrown around casually and most people seem to have forgotten its implications. (Similarly lost is the significance of April 22 — Earth Day; don’t pretend like you remember.) Of course, there are those dutiful citizens who are doing their best to combat global warming: refusing plastic bags at the bodega; driving under 60 mph with the windows up and the air-conditioner off; and buying recycled paper towels. But the actions of a few have next to no impact on global climate change. 

Almost immediately after the first brick was thrown and the first was fire set, British pundits were searching for ways to explain the how and why behind what would become four straight nights of countrywide rioting, the likes of which England had not seen in a quarter of a century.

Unfortunately, U.S. policymakers today seem content to follow the same disastrous path they have for more than half a century. Until the implementation of fundamental changes in U.S. policy in the Middle East — including a draw-down of militarization in the region and, even more importantly, support for a comprehensive and unbiased resolution to the issue of Israeli-Palestinian conflict —America’s rhetoric of freedom, equality and democracy will continue to fall on deaf ears.